Introduction

1. Development of Instructional Radio and Television

The utilization of television broadcast for education in Thailand is dated back in 1964 when the Ministry of Education, in cooperation with the Bangkok Metropolitan Authority, launched an instructional television project to broadcast lessons to primary schools in Bangkok. This pilot project aimed at alleviating the shortage of the well-trained teachers in primary education. In addition to the television broadcast, school radio was also initiated to offer instructional programs for various schools in the country.

Another major development of instructional radio and television began in 1978 when the Ministry of Education launched the Radio Correspondence Project to provide distance education programs from primary education to Pre-university level for the scattered out-of-school population throughout the country. The project utilized radio broadcast, printed instructional texts and other supported media to convey self-instructional lesson to the distance learners. Trained group organizers or facilitators were hired to conduct group meetings and tutorial sessions for the registered learners in each locality. Since the inception of the project, the annual enrollment of distance learner has increase steadily and reached over 812,000 in 1993.

To meet the increasing demand for radio and television broadcast in education, the government of Thailand approved the establishment of the National Education Radio Network in 1979 and the Educational Television Station (Channel 11) in 1985. Both the radio and the television station are administrated by the Public Relation Department and the airtimes are shared by several institutions and agencies including Ramkhamhang University and Sukhothai Thammathirat Open University. These two Open Universities also utilize radio and television broadcasts intensively to support self-learning texts which are designed to be the main medium of distance education courses.

2. Instructional Broadcasts: A New Era of Telecommunication in Education

In recognition of the need to upgrade infrastructure for modern telecommunication and information dissemination, the Government of Thailand granted a concession to Shinawatra Computer and Communications Co., Ltd. To launch the THAICOM Satellite Project.

The first 3 satellites, THAICOM I, THAICOM II and THAICOM III, had been launched into the Geostationary Orbit in December 1993, October 1994 and April 1997 respectively. The first two satellites are HS-376 model which takes shape of cylinder and achieves their stability in space by rotating around their axis. Each of the first two THAICOM satellites has 10 C-Band transponders and 2 Ku-Band transponders. The coverage of C-Band transmission includes most countries in East and Southeast Asia. The Ku-Band transmission is focused on Thailand and adjacent countries in Indo-China.

THAICOM III is Spacebus 3000 model which is much more bigger and more effective than the first 2 satellites. It has 24 C-Band transponders and 14 KU-Band transponders. The coverage of C-Band transmission includes 4 continents, namely Asia, Europe, Australia and Africa. The KU-Band Spot Beam is focused on Thailand and adjacent countries in Indo-China whereas Ku-Band Steerable Beam can be moved anywhere within 4 mentioned continents.

Applications and utilization of the THAICOM satellite include distribution, relay and live broadcasting of radio and television, satellite telephony, satellite communications network and very small aperture terminal. In addition, with the very high frequency of Ku-Band transmission (14 GHz and 12 GHz), Direct-to-home (DTH) television broadcasting system can be established to deliver television programs to every household and remote community that install the receiver sets.

3. The Utilization of THAICOM Satellite for Education

In support of the policy to utilize modern communication and information technologies for education, on March 29, 1994 the Cabinet endorsed a plan proposed by the Non-formal Education Department to launch a satellite distance education with the THAICOM Foundation, a non-profit organization. The project was an attempt to apply advanced satellite communications technology to the improvement of the educational system. It was also a consequence of the fact that Thailand had acquired its first satellite, THAICOM, which was sent into orbit from the city of Kuru in the French Guyana on December 17, 1993. His Majesty the King graciously bestowed the name THAICOM, a shortened name for Thai Commanacom (meaning Thai communication) upon this satellite.

In this connection, the Satellite Distance Education Project was initiated to provide television broadcasts through the THAICOM Satellite, using the Ku-Band transmission with Direct-to-Home broadcasting system during the year 1994-1999. The Satellite Distance Education Project is a join effort of the government organization (Non-formal Education Department) and private sector (THAICOM Foundation). Under the cooperation, the Foundation provides one free channel of Ku-Band transmission through THAICOM satellite.

The Direct-to-Home (DTH) television broadcasting system is utilized to deliver distance teaching to the learners in all provinces, especially those in the very remote areas of the country. Through the DTH system, television programs will be transmitted from Educational Television Station (ETV) at the Center for Educational Technology to the THAICOM Satellite Station through a microwave link. After going through the process of encoding and digital compression, the transmission will be up linked to the satellite in the Geostationary Orbit and down linked directly to the receiving system which includes a small satellite dish (60-80 cm), an integrated receiver and decoder equipment and a television set.